Here Be Dragons
by rgm0005
Summary: There was fire in my blood. Scales beneath my skin. I could feel them both, trying to burst free-but I had to hold on. I tried not to give in, no matter how badly I wanted to hurt them. But everything has it's limits and this was the end of mine. What if Taylor had gotten Lung's powers instead of the Administrator Shard?
1. Spark 1-1

**Here Be Dragons**

**Spark 1.1**

My bones were hot. It wasn't something that I could explain in any other way—not that I intended to _tell_ anyone about it. The air felt cool on my skin and even the flesh beneath felt cold against the heat that was radiating from the core of my body. If I let it go, as I had before, it would expand, spreading warmth—_heat_—through my muscles and out to my skin.

It was tempting to let it—very, very tempting. It was hard to restrain myself day after day and the pressure was mounting, building until I felt like I'd pop. And part of me wanted to—knew what it'd mean and _desired_ it.

But I couldn't, I had to hold on. I could control this, I knew that. I'd managed to keep it in check for nearly half a year now.

But _damn it_ if they weren't making it hard. It would have been easier if I was away from people—alone in my room. I'd have brought flames to my hands and it would have…not made it easier, not really. In fact, it would have come back worse. But for a while it'd have been soothing, simply knowing that I had the power at my fingertips and could bring it out.

But here in school? Here, so close to the source of it all?

I could feel my scales moving beneath my skin. Even more than usual, after so recently having been humiliated and having had my hard work taken from me. Even just when I exhaled, my breath felt warmer than it should have been. I inhaled deeply and held my breath, trying to force it and myself to cool down.

"I asked you after the glue incident. I'm asking you again. Would you be willing to go to the office with me, to talk with the principal and vice principal?" Mr. Gladly asked.

I was silent for a few moments, considering it—and preparing myself to speak. My powers had made me stronger, tougher, let me heal faster, and control flames somewhat even when I was normal—but they'd changed my voice as well. When I talked, I had to be careful to sound like my old self, rather than speaking in a rumbling growl. I usually dealt with this by not talking much at school, but when I had to I always needed a moment to make sure. It was one of the many troublesome things I just had to put up with and be careful about here at school.

"What would happen?" I asked, sounding almost right.

"We'd have a discussion about what's been going on. You would name the person or people you believe responsible, and each of them would be called in to talk to the principal, in turn."

"And they'd get expelled?" I asked, though I already knew the answer and the thought just made my scales brush harder against the underside of my skin.

He shook his head and the confirmation did nothing but make it harder.

"If there was enough proof, they would be suspended for several days, unless they've done something very serious. Further offenses could lead to longer suspensions or expulsion."

"Great. So at best, they'd miss a few days of school, and only if I can prove they were behind it all…and whether they get suspended or not, they come back feeling a hundred percent justified in whatever else they do to me in revenge." I chuckled bitterly, the back of my eyes starting to burn. It would have been bad enough if it was just tears, but I wasn't that lucky. The last thing I needed was for the bullying to get worse right now.

I was barely holding back as it was.

"If you want things to get better, Taylor, you have to start somewhere." Mr. Gladly said, his tone reasonable.

"This isn't a starting point. This is shooting myself in the foot," I said as I pulled on my book bag. When I saw that he didn't have a reply, I left the classroom.

Emma, Madison, Sophia and a half dozen other girls were waiting for me in the hall.

My shoulders fell before the insults even started, feeling like a weight was settling upon them. They were already talking—to each other, ostensibly. I tried to brush by them but they quietly shifted to block my path, not looking at me or stopping their conversation.

"I mean, nobody likes her. Nobody even wants her here," Julia said.

_I know._

"I _know_. She's such a loser. Did you know she didn't even turn in the project for art, last Friday," Sophia responded.

_Because you broke it._

"If she's not going to try, then why is she even coming to school?"

My hands clinched into fists as they voiced the question I'd asked myself. Why was I here? Why did I come? Because I _had_ to?

I didn't **have** to do anything anymore.

The heat behind my eyes increased—as in, it literally got hotter. This was how it always went. For all that they seemed to be talking to each other, this was all about insulting me and I knew it. Careful to retain deniability by not talking _to_ me, not even really facing me, and yet hurting me as much as they could. They'd literally cornered me, slowly, pushing me against the window and crowding around me such that I couldn't get past them without pushing them out of the way. And then they just rained down the insults, the next starting the moment one finished. It wasn't a matter of being accurate, creative, or even about meaning what they said; in fact, many of the insults were contradictory. It was a matter of intent and hammering it in again and again—that they hated me, that they enjoyed seeing me in pain, that they reveled in my suffering, that I was disgusting, tiny, weak, stupid, and generally unpleasant. It was about bringing up past humiliations and mocking me with them without directly admitting to any of it—in jokes, at my expense.

They talked about how they ruined my homework by calling me stupid for how it had affected my grades. They called me ugly, referencing the times they'd ruined my clothes and made me look horrible. Discussed how no one liked me without bringing up the fact that it was because they had driven away everyone who might be my friend.

The heat began to spread, despite how hard I tried to clamp down. I understood what it wanted—what _I_ wanted—but I couldn't. It was something I dreamed of, something I desired more than anything else—but I forbid myself, kept myself in check. I had to. I could blame it on my power—say it was the cause of these feelings—but that'd have been a lie and I knew it. It was me. And if I knew anything, I knew myself.

So I knew that if I gave in, if I started, then I wouldn't stop. It all played back into a single thought and single memory and single wish I'd clung to in the locker and through all of this. A wish that, ironically, the only thing keeping me from was myself.

_I would make them pay twice over for what they'd done to me._

It was the thought that kept me going.

It was the thought that held me back.

It was ironic, in a way. They _wanted_ me to fight them, thought they had all the advantages. If I fought with words or fists, they didn't think it mattered. If I argued and lost, it'd only serve to satisfy them. If I argued and _won_, they'd come down twice as hard next time. If I threw a punch, they thought they'd be able to go running to a teacher and it'd be the story of ten against the story of one.

_I_ thought that if I threw a punch, they'd probably end up in a hospital. If I didn't go too far, which I wasn't sure I wouldn't if I gave myself the chance.

So I stood by. I said nothing and stared blankly past them as the words rained down. It hurt—despite it all, the words still hurt—but I was used to it. Dealing with my scales rubbing the underside of my skin…that was more difficult and got harder every time as the amount of payback I owed them increased. It was especially difficult as I stared past them at Emma, who stood back with a slight smile on her lips, observing and waiting. My former best friend. I owed her more than most.

The opening of a door drew my attention and for a moment I was grateful for the distraction—and then I saw what it was. Mr. Gladly exiting his classroom. The girls around me didn't seem to notice, didn't stop even as he locked his door.

He turned, looking at me for a moment.

And then he walked away.

My scales nearly burst forth then and there. Not five minutes ago, he'd been trying to convince me to go to the principal, try and prove I was being bullied, and here he _sees it_ and walks away? Had he been trying to get plausible deniability, doing the bare minimum to address a problem that he couldn't ignore any more? Had he just given up after failing to help in his utterly ineffectual way? Decided I wasn't worth the effort?

My bones got hotter. I held my breath for a moment before exhaling slowly, trying to keep any fire from coming up with it. It didn't keep the air from heating but none of the girl's around me seemed to notice that. Idiots—I'd held on, kept from hurting them for six months, but I was getting dangerously close to breaking. And if _I_ snapped, well, it wouldn't be a school shooting. This place would look like Sodom and Gomorrah after I was done paying back what I was due—and Mr. Gladly hadn't helped my control by adding to it.

For a moment, I wished we were guys. That this had been physical, that I could fight back. Even without my enhanced strength, I was in good shape—if it had been normal humans against normal humans I'd have lost, sure, but I could have broken a few noses, given some black eyes before their numbers rode me down, and this would be over. I'd have hurt for days, worried my dad, but I'd know they would all have been hurting too. If it got too bad, the school would have to pay attention, maybe suspend us all but certainly look into why about ten people had beaten up one guy. And if we added my powers to the picture, well…

But when it came to this, to name calling and emotional abuse, it was like it wasn't real just because it didn't leave any bruises. I was powerless here, unless I wanted to make this war nuclear—which I could, oh so very easily. But I couldn't, so it was just the popular girls against the freak who didn't talk much and kept missing homework. Their word against mine. And if I used my powers, the PRT would get involved and things would just get even worse for me. Even if I limited myself, they'd make up a story and I'd come to school with the reputation of a psycho and they the victims and the bullying would get worse as others joined in.

Unless I was willing to take it to the extremes I could, there was nothing I could do except take it until they ran out of steam, which they thankfully seemed to be starting to do. But I had to ask myself the same question I did every time this happened—how long could I keep this up? How long could I keep my power in check when it grew harder every day? How long before something made me snap?

Emma finally stepped forward.

"What's the matter, Taylor? You look upset."

The sudden words put me off-guard and I knew she had something in reserve, had been preparing something, waiting patiently to deliver the coup de grace. I braced myself for it, reminded myself I'd taken the worst she had for months, that there was nothing she could do that could really hurt me anymore.

And then she spoke and the shattered remains of my defenses came crashing down around me.

"So upset you're going to cry yourself to sleep for a straight week?"

It took me a moment to grasp that, to truly understand the meaning of those words. Memories came first, of the year before high school, when we'd been friends. When I'd heard the news of my mom's death and had broken and cried and crumbled. When she had cried with me. When I'd hadn't eaten for days because my dad was too much of a wreck to cook and had hide at her home until her mom spoke to him and things began to get better.

I thought of a time months later, when I'd begun to pick up the pieces. When I'd put myself back together and realized I'd survive. When Emma had told me she admired me for my strength, how I'd held it together for a month—and I'd told her, knowing she was my best friend and would never use it against me, that I wasn't strong. That I'd cried myself to sleep every night for an entire week.

And here we were.

I looked at her wordlessly. My mouth hung open as I stared and I couldn't bring myself to close it. She knew what she was doing, knew what it would make me think off, and for all that I knew what she was trying to do it fucking _worked_.

But she didn't really understand what she had done—the answer she'd given me.

My eyes burned with the memory of tears.

_Wow._

Then, they burned with actual tears, dredged up by the memories and the betrayal.

_Apparently, only for ten more seconds_.

And then they just _burned_.

**XxXXxX**


	2. Spark 1-2

**Spark 1.2**

The tight grasp I'd kept on my powers for so long shattered and it came bursting forth. In some ways, it was terrifying as all the fears, the pain, the insecurity, the shame—as all the things they'd done to me—caught flame in the burning depths of my heart, igniting into a conflagration that I knew I wouldn't be able to reign in or put out.

But more than that, it was a relief. This was what I'd wanted to do for so long. This was what I'd denied myself, kept myself from, out of fear of what would happen—this. Deep down, maybe I'd always known that this would happen eventually—that eventually, I wouldn't be able to take it anymore and would snap. I'd held off, tried to endure and not think about it, but I think I'd known I wouldn't be able to get all the way through high school like this. I think I'd understood, since the day I'd triggered, that something like this would eventually happen, just given the nature of my powers and who I was.

And keeping it from happening had _hurt_. Actually hurt. I didn't truly realize that except in hindsight, because it had been a gradual thing, building up slightly each day until I noticed the strain of holding back but not really the pain of doing so, until it was gone. And now that it was…

I felt free.

_I don't think I can stop now, mom. I'm even not sure I want to._

I rolled a step forward, scales bursting from my skin. The girls were in my way, expressions of dawning terror coloring their expressions, but I just shoved them out of the way. One arm was enough to swing the weight of four of the girls and send them sliding ten feet down the hallway. I didn't bother being careful and several of them bounced off the lockers on either side of the hall. I think one might have clipped their head on it and I saw a little bleeding, but I honestly didn't care. I knew all the names, all the faces, all the crimes—but at the moment, I was focused, paying only slight attention to most of them.

Emma, Madison, and Sophia were my main tormentors, with the other just making my life miserable to impress them. Which didn't mean I wasn't angry with them, but I had my priorities. I grabbed another girl, frozen in fear as everything went wrong around her and she realized she'd ended up siding with Chris against Carrie, and absently flicked my wrist—an almost casual gesture that still had the strength to lift her off her feet and throw her five feet away and bounce her off a doorframe. She staggered heavily, coughed roughly, and grabbed her ribs in pain—but, despite that, started running. Three of the four I'd tossed aside before scrambled to their feet and ran as well, leaving behind the fourth, now unconscious.

It seemed only then that the situation caught up with the four that were left standing. One was some girl in my Computer class I didn't bother paying attention to—but I took a hopping step forward to land next to Madison and Sophia. I grabbed Madison's left arm hard enough that she screamed and I felt something break beneath my fingers. Reaching out absently with my other hand, I backhanded Sophia in the stomach hard enough to send her crashing into the lockers. She made a sound that might have been a scream if I hadn't thoroughly knocked the breath out of her before she fell to her knees and started to vomit. I looked down at her for a moment—one of my chief tormentors kneeling and humiliated at my feet—and half-dragged, half-threw Madison as her screams got annoying. She crashed into the lockers on the opposite side of the hall, slamming into them right in front of Emma as she tried to run and cutting off her escape route.

With the mounting strength in my legs, jumping across the hallway was trivial and I landed right in front of my former best friend, stopping my forward momentum by slamming a hand into the locker to her left before I hit her. And I meant _into_—my hand sank into it up to my elbow, stopping only after denting the back of it. I placed my other hand more lightly on the other side of her, caging her in before leaning towards her.

"Emma," I said, not bothering to change my voice this time. It came out as a fierce rumble and either it, her name, or Madison's nearby whimper drew a wince from her.

"T-Taylor." She said. "Y-you're a—"

"A Parahuman," I finished for her, keeping my tone polite. It was kind of embarrassing to admit, but the first night I'd had super powers, I'd practiced my new voice in front of the mirror, pretending I was a superhero. Fierce voices, snarls, classic and clichéd lines from movies—but with a voice like mine, it can be easy to slip into unintelligibility if I wasn't careful. My favorite voice, for that reason, was this one; with calm, careful pronunciations, I could remain fairly understandable until my mouth changed. I even had a smile to go with it, maybe curb some of the more freighting aspects of my powers—can't go terrifying the civilians, after all. After my attempts at being a hero had fallen through, I'd given up on it, but I tried to force myself to use it now, with my emotions running so high, but something about it made Emma pale so it probably hadn't worked. "Yes. I have you to thank for that, in a way. I got my powers in the locker you put me in."

"I-I," She tried, before changing tracks. "It wasn't me who—"

"It was you," I said bluntly, pausing when I felt the heat of my breath before continuing. "It may not have been you who shoved me in and I doubt you personally filled it up. Maybe it wasn't even your _idea_. It doesn't matter—you went along with it, put me in and locked me up with all of that _filth_. You could have stopped it or let me out or told someone or helped me—but you _didn't_. Instead, you laughed. Like you did with my mom's flute. When you humiliated me. When you stole from me. Insulted me. _Betrayed_ me."

My smile faltered for a moment but I simply tried harder, forcing it back into place. My teeth hadn't changed yet, but Emma swallowed.

"You know, I was locked in there for a long time, Emma," I said. "I didn't get my powers immediately, you see. I tried to pound down the door, but all I did was make my knuckles bleed—it's not like now, where I can do this."

I flexed the fingers of my right hand and the metal of the locker door warped and crumbled beneath it, a casual demonstration of strength and Emma's skin became even paler, almost sickly looking.

"I thought I was going to die," I admitted, pretended I hadn't done anything. "I exhausted myself until I collapsed in that _shit_ and still no one came. I lost track of time in the horrible stench and the darkness and wasn't sure if days had passed or mere hours, but I honestly struggled until I couldn't even move anymore and it wasn't enough. And then I triggered. But leading up to all that, do you know what I'd thought about, Emma?"

I kept my tone polite, conversational, keeping my smile fixed in place. I shifted my right arm, moving so that it was my forearm pressed against the locker instead of my hand. In this position, I could take advantage of the fact that I was one of the tallest girls in school and lean over Emma, look down on her. I knew from what little practicing and modelling I could do that my eyes had become glowing, molten orbs by now and I forced Emma to look into them.

"W-w-what?" She asked after seeing I was waiting for a reply.

"You. All of you. The one's who'd done it to me. Somehow, someway, I'd get out and make you pay. I'd make you suffer _twice_ as bad. And ironically, when my wish was granted, when I got the power to do so…I hesitated. I didn't want to become like _you_. But you know…I can be a bitch too, if I want to be. I really, really can. I've learned from the best, you know? I can hurt you."

"You d-don't want to do t-that, Taylor," She said.

Giggles bubbled up from somewhere deep inside me, taking me by surprise. I swallowed them down quickly, but a few managed to escape.

"Actually," I told her. "I kind of do."

"They'd put you in the Birdcage." She said, seeming to gain confidence. "They'd lock you up with the biggest monsters around and throw away the key. It's a hell with no escape."

"Sounds like high school, only more fun," I told her. "Let me worry about that—you focus on the matter at hand. What am I going to do with you, Emma? I'm open to ideas, if you want to help. Come up with an idea that makes up for what you've done to me and I'll try to be forgiving. Can you think of anything? I said I'd pay you back for everything you'd done to me, but I'm honestly not sure how to get back for that much."

Emma swallowed again and I looked at her, thinking.

"I could put you in a locker, too," I said, drumming the fingers of my right hand, my nails leaving tiny little dents, honestly pondering the matter. In all my dreams of revenge, I'd never really thought about this part, oddly—I knew I'd pay them back but hadn't let myself consider how, worried it'd lead to, well, this. "It'd be a start. But it'd take too much time to gather all the stuff and let it ripen. I've dreamed of doing that to you guys, just a bit, but it sounds like a lot of work, especially since people are probably on their way."

I frowned, tilting my head to the side before looking around, musing all the while.

"I could make do." I said, speaking more to myself then her. "Put you in a locker and heat things up a bit."

Flames erupted around my arms, not intense enough to melt the metal yet, but hot enough that Emma flinched and drew away from the lockers—which meant drawing closer to me. She froze as she realized that, seeming to realize she was stuck.

"Remember when we used to bake stuff in your mom's oven?" I asked her, considering it, trying to decide if I could do it, if I _should_. "I'm guessing it'd be a lot like that, except you'd be alive while it happened. It'd probably hurt a lot. I could make you _suffer_, Emma. I have the power to do so, so why shouldn't I? That was enough for _you_, right?"

"S-Sophia," She said, eyes frantic.

"I don't_ care_ about who did what; you were all involved. I'll get to her later." I told her bluntly, but she wasn't even looking at me now.

"Sophia!" She repeated, shouting—and I wasn't sure even she knew what she was saying or why, but she buckled, pressing her back against the heated lockers and kicking me even as the heat made her whimper. The blow caught me in the stomach and did all of nothing as I looked at her, silently.

Then I turned my head as someone stabbed me in the back. Sophia had recovered. I hadn't really been paying attention to her, but it explained what Emma had been saying, a bit. A part of me wondered where she'd gotten the knife, but it didn't really matter.

I turned my body so that my left hand was still buried in the locker, but my right shoulder was pointed in Sophia's direction, letting me see them both. Paying attention to my surroundings again, I listened to see if I had missed anything else. My scales which had slowed their growth when I had so easily crushed my enemies began erupting again now that they were fighting back and after a moment I could feel my senses becoming clearer, sharper. I could hear yelling in the distance, shouting and panicking. Probably people calling the PRT or something.

I wondered what I'd do when they got here. I honestly wasn't sure. Surrender, maybe, after I was done? Or I could run, go…somewhere. I hadn't really considered the idea of doing anything that could bring them down on me before now, so I wasn't sure.

I frowned in thought and squinted as the world became even more blurred. I reached up and removed my glasses, putting things back into focus. My eyes had been fixed when I'd got my powers, but I'd worn them all this time anyway, pretending that things were still the same.

Now, I dropped them to the ground and stepped on them absently before reaching behind me with my free hand and dealing with the secondary annoyance, pulling the knife free. The wound it left behind began closing immediately, scales rising up to keep it from happening again, but I just looked at the weapon I held in my hands. Pretty good quality, I guessed, though I wasn't much of a judge. Also, covered in my blood, which I wiped off on my shirt even as the heat rising from my hand began to quickly dry it.

I looked at Sophia, raising an eyebrow.

"Stabbing the monster?" I asked. "Really? You're like one of those girls in a bad horror movie."

I threw it at her, hard. So hard that it passed right through her, pierced the locker behind her, and slid in up to the hilt.

No, that wasn't right. It had passed through her, but not because of how hard I'd thrown it—for a moment, she'd turned dark, becoming smoke and shadow, and the knife had simply passed through her like she wasn't there.

I frowned, noticing several things, one of which made me really mad—but my thoughts were a jumble in the face of the sudden realization, too mixed up for me to determine precisely what I thought was so important.

"You're a parahuman," I said, rather stupidly. Obviously she was a parahuman if she'd turned into smoke or something. That wasn't what bothered me so much, so I tried following it up with another thing I'd realized at seeing her transform. "Shadow Stalker. You're Shadow Stalker."

Sophia backed up, reached back to grab the heated knife, and removed it from the locker door by going shadowy for a moment. I glanced down and exhaled slowly, trying to figure out why I was getting so angry. My frown deepened before turning into something else—a mockery of a smile that I didn't feel, maybe; my body falling back on the faked expression without me consciously thinking about it.

"You're a Ward," I remembered a moment later; an unimportant detail I'd picked up somewhere in the months of research that had followed gaining my powers, that she'd joined the Wards at some point—and it was then that I understood why I was so upset. "You're a _hero_?"

My polite tone evaporated as I snarled the last word, stepping towards her and away from Emma. I ripped my left arm from the locker as I did, tearing off the door in the process, and I grabbed it with the same hand. The fire that had been building beneath my skin got hotter then, stoked into an inferno as I understood. As I realized that the heroes I'd looked up to—wanted to become—had taken Shadow Stalker in, made her one of them. That they'd abided by her behavior, if not approved of it, and had failed me horribly in the process.

Who else knew? Did the teachers know? The principal? Was _this_ why Sophia could get away with everything she'd done to me? Because she was a hero and I was just a normal girl?

The scales began rising from my skin faster and I saw a spark of weariness appear in Sophia's eyes—worry. I felt strength surge through me along with the heat that wanted to come out—and I let it, erupting from my hands and winding all the way up my arms in burning spirals. My shirt began burning but I didn't care—I'd known, on some level, that it would happen the moment I'd started transforming. I had more important things to worry about.

"_You're_ a fucking _hero_!?" I shouted—roared, really; the sound human but unbelievably loud. My foot slammed into the floor hard enough to send a spider web of cracks through it—and hard enough to propel me at my enemy.

**XxXXxX**


End file.
